This post is a departure from what you might be expecting, as I’ve been I have been tagged by fellow English Historical Fiction author, Mark Patton, to take part in a “Main Characters” blog hop. The concept of ‘blog hops’ between authors is to introduce aspects of our works to readers and of course to support our writing colleagues across the ethers. For this ‘hop’ the idea is to introduce a protagonist from a published or anticipated to be published novel. I’m currently working on the third novel of my historical fiction series which takes place across 12th, 13th and 21st century lines, mainly in Great Britain…although the current work in progressis built upon the esoteric story of the Cathars, the Gnostic sect persecuted by the Inquisition in 13th c southern France. If you’ve been following my blog, you’ll have seen earlier posts on this gentle group of Christians labeled as heretics by Rome who met a fiery end at Montsegur on March 16, 1244.

Each of my books is grounded in actual historical places, people and events around which I then build fictional characters and story. The participating authors in the blog hop are asked to address seven questions about their chosen protagonist. Mysecond book which is featured in this ‘hop’ is written in ‘alternating narrative’ which means that similar to the works of Diana Gabaldron and MJ Rose, the main protagonist is subject to images and influences from a past life–this said I’m going to introduce both of my female protagonists to you!

1. What is the name of your character, and is he or she a fictional or a historical person?

In the 12th c portions of this book, Edana Morggon is the main protagonist who then re-appears as Dr. Dana Morgan in the 21st century. Both women are completely fictional although, the characters they meet in both time frames are very much historical.

2. When and where is the story set?

The primary historical setting is Glastonbury Abbey in England’s west country, just before the Great Fire of 1184 as well as ruins that remain in the 21st century. For those who have never been to Glastonbury, it’s one of those places that abounds in extraordinarily deep history, legend and myth. King Arthur, Joseph of Armithea, Edward I, Henry II and The Goddess, each figure heavily into Glastonbury’s magic. However, in 1184 and 2010, my protagonists are faced with events that involve the fire(and its suspicious origins), political ambition, greed and psychological dysfunction… all having to do with mystical secrets believed to have been embedded within symbols placed in the floor of the abbey’s ‘Holy of Holies’.

12th c Lady Edana Morggon is a wealthy widow who accompanied her father and greedy, abusive husband to the Holy Land. Following the deaths of both men on crusade, Edana was imprisoned but surprisingly rescued by an unusual Sufi named Ghali. Ghali for reasons only known to himself and Edana, enlists desert mystics to educate her in sacred arts and medicine before they both return to her estate in England. Edana is a woman unusual for her time as she’s fierce in personality, smart, gifted and fairly self-sufficient…but she also harbors secrets.

21st c Dr. Dana Morgan is a wealthy, University of Chicago historical archaeologist with expertise in ancient scripts, but who also possesses an inherited, although unacknowledged, gift of psychic sensitivities. As the 21st c opens, her archaeologist husband of five years has suddenly died. Overtaken by grief, Dana retreats to the safe haven of her favorite aunt, Lady Fredi Morgan at her Oxfordshire estate. When Dana is introduced to two historical archaeologists from Oxford University, she unwittingly becomes embroiled in 900 year old Glastonbury mysteries that have resurfaced and threaten her life. Equally distressing, Dana comes face to face with a past life through Edana Morggon. However predictably, as a scientist, she resists acknowledging such a possibility exists.

Photography courtesy of Karen Pfiefer

4. What is the main conflict? What messes up your character’s life?

Historically, Dana has categorized her feelings into intellectual exercises as a means of protection ever since the sudden death of her parents when she was fifteen. However, when she learns that her husband had a secret life which ended in suicide rather than murder, she struggles to come to terms with heart centered emotions she can’t control, her sense of failure in judgement and the recognition of her inherited psychic sensitivities. As Glastonbury’s 12th century story resurfaces in 2010 through events that threaten her life, Dana is forced to deal with these unresolved aspects of herself.

5. What is the personal goal of your character?

Dana has to learn to accept who she really is as well as putting trust in relationships, especially with men. In addition, with the help of Edana Morggon, she begins to recognize that the veil between worlds is thin and can transmute to reveal universal truths.

6. Is there a working title for this novel, and can we read more about it?

The Great Fire of 1184, which all but destroyed Britain’s oldest site of Christianity,Glastonbury Abbey, is legendary. For 900 years, myth and speculation have flourished as to the cause of this catastrophic event. The majority speculation put forth by historians is that unusual winds on the morning of May 25, 1184 were responsible, causing an entry curtain to the ‘Holy of Holies’ in the ‘Ecclesia Vestuta’ (old church) to catch fire from burning candles. Regardless of the cause, the initial sparks of flame combined with the high winds took the famous abbey to the ground in a matter of hours; it’s precious documents destroyed along with its treasures melted by heat and countless graves of monks, abbots and saints.

However, when I was researching this event for my historical mystery, ‘A Conspiracy of Ravens’, I discovered Adam of Damerham. Adam was a 12th century monk who wrote a history of the abbey and where the Glastonbury fire is concerned, Adam had an entirely different theory as to its cause. Following the death of the beloved Abbot Robert in 1178, King Henry II assigned the position of ‘Custodian’ to Peter D’Marcy, a Cluniac monk who had some kind of relationship to Henry. Despite the desires of the Glastonbury monks for Henry to name a proper abbot, the king stalled. With no abbot in place it gave the wily monarch direct access to Glastonbury’s wealthy treasury, a resource which Henry needed to finance his wars with the French. Thus, as a compromise, he named D’Marcy to oversee the Glastonbury community.

Unfortunately Peter proved to be very unpopular for a variety of reasons. He nearly drove the abbey into the ground financially, was relentlessly diabolical in his scheming to manipulate his way to the abbot’s chair, not to mention suspicions that Peter ‘compressed’ (as in eliminated) certain monks who were obstacles to achieving this goal. As an interim solution and effort to appease the monks, Henry then appointed Hugh of Avalon(who would later become Hugh of Lincoln, the most revered saint after Becket) to ‘supervise’ D’Marcy. Things did not go well with this arrangement either.

By December of 1183, the hatred of D’Marcy was beyond rampant. Further to his other machinations, Peter lusted after the secret behind the zodiacal floor in the abbey’s ‘Holy of Holies, believed to contain Christianity’s deepest mystical mysteries. In one final scheme to endear the monks to his cause of obtaining the ‘abbot’s chair’, D’Marcy, his mental state now suspect, planned a ‘faux mass’ on Christmas Eve in the ‘Ecclesia Vestuta.’ This blasphemous act was the last straw with the Glastonbury community and one can only imagine how the monks reacted. Adam of Damerham speculates that in retaliation, D’Marcy set fire to the abbey. Interestingly, historians note that while he survived the fire, shortly afterwards D’Marcy died from ‘unknown causes.’

It was my recent pleasure to interview Chicago’s own best seller author, Jamie Freveletti, one of this year’s ‘featured authors’ for the 2014 Love Is Murdermystery/thriller writer’s conference February 7,8 & 9, 2014 at the Inter-Continental Chicago O’Hare Hotel.

A trial attorney, martial artist, and runner and holds a black belt in aikido, a Japanese martial art. After law school she lived in Geneva, Switzerland while obtaining a diploma in International Studies. Back in Chicago, she represented clients in areas ranging from class actions for mass salmonella poisoning to securities fraud. Her debut thriller, Running from the Devil, was chosen as a “Notable Book” by the Independent Booksellers of America, awarded “Best First Novel” by the International Thriller Writers, awarded a Barry Award for “Best First Novel” by Deadly Pleasures Magazine, and nominated for a Macavity Award for” Best First Mystery” by the Mystery Readers International and “Favorite First Novel of 2009” by Crimespree Magazine. It has been translated into three languages and was an international bestseller.

Her second novel, Running Dark, released in June, 2010, hit both the Chicagoland and South Florida bestseller lists and the third novel in her series, The Ninth Day released in September, 2011 and was chosen as one of the “Best Thrillers of 2011” by Suspense Magazine.

In January, 2011, she was tapped by the Estate of Robert Ludlum to write the next in the Covert One series. That novel,Robert Ludlum’s The Janus Reprisal, released on September 11, 2012. The fourth in her series, Dead Asleep released on October 30, 2012 and hit #1 on Amazon’s kindle bestseller.

Q: Jamie, your biography states that you’re a trial attorney. I’m sure your readers are curious to know whether you’re still actively practicing law or if you are now writing full time. And, if you’re still actively practicing, how do you manage to do this and yet write such wonderful books in fairly quick succession?

A: Since the Ludlum deal (where I was asked to write a book for the Covert One series) in addition to my own series, I have pursued writing as a full time career. It was clear that with two books a year to write that I needed to make a choice about how to best manage my time. I resigned from the firm and focused on writing.

Q: In the current publishing climate, the odds of a new fiction author landing a contract with one of the ‘big six’ is very difficult, even when they have a prominent agent. What led you to decide to enter this arena with its somewhat discouraging statistics and how did you obtain your agent?

A: I’ll never forget the moment that I decided to pursue a contract with a “big six” house. It was in 2007 and the current e-book revolution hadn’t happened yet. I had been pitching to smaller houses that seemed more available and open to new authors. I was asked to create a CD with special requirements to submit to one. I’m technologically savvy, so I wasn’t worried about doing it, but I was still working as an attorney, raising two small children, and writing in the dead of night after I got the kids to bed. I remember thinking that I wasn’t going to be able to slot in even more time to package, distribute and market a novel in what was the then traditional manner. I made a decision at that moment to pursue an agent and shoot for the big houses.

I sat down and made a list of my “dream” editors and kept it on my desk. When I spilled coffee on it I wiped it off and posted it above my computer. Every day I looked at that list. In 2008, when my book Running From The Devil was acquired, it was by one of the editors on that list! I also timed my query letters to allow for about two months before the next International Thriller Writer’s conference, where I knew they were having an “agentfest.”

I slaved over the query and submitted it cold to a batch of agents that I found through a search on publishers marketplace.com. Publishers Marketplace has a search engine that allows you to find all the thriller deals and the agents that sold them for the past several years. I picked active agencies that had sold thrillers in the past year and sent out the query. My current agent, Barbara Poelle, was brand new at the time and was one of several who contacted me. We met at Agentfest, clicked immediately, and three months later she sold the book. I credit the opportunity of being able to meet her in person as a key element that sealed the deal for both of us.

Q: The publishing achievements of trial attorneys such as yourself, Turow and Grisham, would seem to indicate that there are particular skills acquired during your long years of legal training and courtroom experience which lend themselves to such successes. This said, what in your experience would you say that might be directly related to such outcomes in general, and are there any particular skills that are a carry-over from your own training and practice as a trial attorney?

A: As litigators we have to tell a client’s story to a judge or jury in a way that makes sense and conveys the client’s intentions and acts. It’s perfect training for a writer to learn both the value of point of view and the need to order events in a way to form a plot. It’s invaluable.

Also, on a more mundane level, I have to again turn to the idea of time. Lawyers bill in small increments, sometimes as little as six minutes. You learn early on in your law career that time is valuable and become very aware of when you are wasting it. The discipline of billing hours has made me more effective in ordering my day now as a writer, because it takes a lot of self discipline to keep focused on a goal when it’s just you and your keyboard and a beautiful, sunny day is beckoning!

Q: Many years ago at ‘Dark and Stormy Nights’ I attended a session featuring Sara Paretsky. One of the attendees asked her if V.I. Warshawski was her alter ego to which Sara replied there were aspects of V.I. she felt were her alter ego and others in V.I. which she would like to have, but didn’t. With your main heroine, Emma Caldridge, readers can certainly see a bit of you in her from just reading your biography, but are there aspects of you in Emma the reader doesn’t see or characteristics of her that you might like to have or acquire in the future?

A: Emma is not me in a lot of ways. She’s a scientist, and that makes her much less emotional than I am. She is unafraid of plunging into dangerous areas of the world and is a bit of a loner. She is also a ton more patient than I am. I’m a social, emotional person who laughs more and worries a whole lot more than she does. I’d love to be able to slow down my brain and be more patient. I am patient with my kids, but get me behind the wheel of a car and in a traffic jam and I can feel the disbelief rising. Can it possibly take this long to drive a mile? Thank god for the radio. Music is what I love as much as reading. When the weather permits you’ll find me running errands on my bike and not in my car. What we do have in common is athleticism. I love to run, bike and keep active, and so does she.

Q: Every author in the mystery/thriller genre works differently during the process of creating interaction and tension between characters against a background of escalating threads of action that eventually are drawn together. Some use detailed grids, others use story boards or outlines and some let the story unfold once the initial germ of an idea or ideas is grounded in their mind. In your creative process, what have you found works best for you and do you always use the same process?

A: I’m a seat of the pants writer through and through. I never know where a book will go when I sit down to write it. I have a simple, one or two sentence premise and I hit the keyboard. It keeps me interested through the months it takes to write a book. I’m discovering the story in the same, fresh way that a reader does. Having said that, I have been asked by the Ludlum Estate to present a synopsis of the book that I wrote for them. I shuddered when I first started that process, but I do see the beauty in planning, albeit just a little. I can’t ever see myself creating a detailed outline, though I have writer friends that do and they swear by them. For me, creating an outline would waste time that would better be spent writing.

Q: Your writing style creates a wonderful ‘sense of place’ which takes the reader right into the locations. As each of your books including The Janus Reprisal, is set in ‘interesting’ places do you feel a writer needs to have experienced the places they use for their stories? And, if this isn’t possible, (especially in the case of foreign locations) do you have suggestions as to how one might successfully create a ‘sense of place’ for the reader even if they haven’t experienced it first hand?

A: I’ve traveled to most of the places that I write about, including Colombia, but not Somalia. For that country I ended up contacting a journalist who was there and we exchanged emails. I also use Google earth and street view. I will watch an area over the course of several days and get a feel for the rhythm of life there. I suggest using Google earth and reading traveler’s blogs, especially back packer blogs.

The bloggers are wonderful in their often detailed explanations of the different areas that they visit. My next Emma Caldridge book is set in West Africa and I’m reading some wonderful postings from Peace Corp and Foreign aid workers. I’ll probably take a trip to Morocco for more research on this one, but I’ll stay in hotels and travel safely. The Peace Corp volunteers really see a country the way that Emma would experience it, and their journals are invaluable to me.

Q: Could you speak a bit about how you came to be tapped by Robert Ludlum’s estate and selected as one of the writers for the ‘Covert One’ series? Do you anticipate that you’ll be writing in the future for the series?

A: My understanding of the process is that the Estate was evaluating several authors that would be a good fit for the series. I learned that I was one of the three finalists on their list in New York after Running From The Devil won ITW’s Best First Novel award. I mean literally after, because I stumbled off the stage in a daze of happiness and tears and went straight out of the ballroom to settle down and regroup. My agent was with me and told me then. I tried not to think about it too much. because one of three, while good odds, is still not a done deal. Three months later Running From The Devil won the Barry award in San Francisco and again, after I got off the podium, my agent told me that we were to meet with representatives of the Estate in the bar for a drink and conversation. I learned then that they wanted me to consider the project. It’s been a great experience and I am in conversation to write a possible second. The details haven’t been pinned down as yet, but I’ll update the “News” section of my website when they are!

Q: Do you have a new book currently in process that your readers can look forward to?

A: Yes! I’m working on the fifth in the Emma Caldridge series. This idea for this one came to me when I was reading about the Dakkar rally, a famous motor race from Paris to Dakkar, Senegal, that crosses the Sahara desert. Seems that the race was moved to South America after the unrest in West Africa and Mauritania became increasingly dangerous. I started reading about the area and decided that it was a fascinating “hot” territory bubbling with unrest and close to exploding.

I put Emma there, and she’ll be caught between two warring terrorist organizations vying for control of West Africa and forced to march to Marrakech through Mauritania. Along the way she collects aide workers and refugees and helps lead them to safety. She also takes on a few guerrilla camps when she finds that they are stealing the aide supplies sent from the West. It’s been a great book to write and is one of my grittier and more socially aware story lines. I’m also working on a stand alone thriller that will feature a new character, and then there’s the possible future Covert One. Needless to say, I’m writing full time and then some!

Q: Finally, given the current publishing landscape that seems to be changing by the hour these days, how do you think it will look for aspiring authors say, within the next three years or so?

A: I’m fairly new to this industry and only have a short time line perspective, but it seems to me that there’s never been so much opportunity for authors to carve their own path than there is now. I love working with publishing houses, but I also enjoy that I can write a short story or novella and have a place to publish them. I wrote a serial novella featuring Emma in three short episodes called Risk, Gone, and Run. They were designed to be short enough to finish on a subway or train ride, but when strung together formed a complete novella and are published only in electronic form. The ability to work in different formats help keep things fresh and interesting, and I love it.

I’m releasing another short story that I wrote, called Buddha’s Black Soul, which grew out of an actual incident. My father lived in rural Missouri and had a beloved German Shepard police dog. Someone in the area began shooting and killing animals under cover of darkness, including cows and other livestock, and Sheba was shot in the jaw. The vet tried to save her, but she died of an infection. I wrote the story out of anger, but when I was done it seemed to be really about karma and how our acts, either good or bad, circle back to us. Hence the title. I hope to release it in late August.

Was St. Patrick ever atGlastonbury Abbey in the early 5th Century? Legend says he was but then, as is the case of many of ancient stories, we’ll never know for sure. There is however, a document known as the Charter of St. Patrick believed to have been written by Glastonbury monks in the late 13th century. The exact purpose isn’t clear, but it does purportedly narrate in his own words, the account of Patrick’s arrival at Glastonbury in 430 A.D. Clearly the gap in time makes the authenticity of the Charter’s narrative suspect and begs the question, why would the monks produce such a document 900 years after the fact? One explanation could be that it was a PR stunt.

Leading up to the catastrophic fire of 1184 which took Britain’s wealthiest abbey to ground, Glastonbury was in a state of political chaos, the circumstances which I write about in my historical mystery, ‘A Conspiracy of Ravens‘(represented by Peter Miller-unpublished). However, despite King Henry II’s support in the abbey’s rebuilding immediately following the fire, down the road the monks needed to sustain pilgrim traffic in order to keep the coffers topped up.

Along with the Arthurian legends which include the re-internment of Arthur and Guinevere at the foot of a black marble high altar during the state visit of Edward I and Eleanor of Castile in 1278, it didn’t hurt to add St. Patrick into the mix. Nevertheless, whether legend, myth or fact, allegedly St. Patrick’s bones are believed to have been buried under the floor of the small chapel shrine that bears his name and stands among Glastonbury’s remains–a claim the Irish understandably, strongly contest.

The Charter of St. Patrick(excerpt)

In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. I Patrick, the humble servant of God, in the year of His Incarnation 430, was sent into Ireland by the most holy Pope Celestine, and by God’s grace converted the Irish to the way of truth; and, when I had established them in the Catholic faith, at length I returned to Britain, and, as I believe, by the guidance of God, who is the life and the way, I chanced upon the isle of Ynsgytrin, wherein I found a place holy and ancient, chosen and sanctified by God in honour of Mary the pure Virgin, the Mother of God: and there I found certain brethren imbued with the rudiments of the Catholic faith, and of pious conversation, who were successors of the disciples of St Phagan and St Deruvian, whose names for the merit of their lives I verily believe are written in heaven: and because the righteous shall be in everlasting remembrance, since tenderly I loved those brethren, I have thought good to record their names in this my writing.

And they are these: Brumban, Hyregaan, Brenwal, Wencreth, Bamtonmeweng, Adelwalred, Lothor, Wellias, Breden, Swelwes, Hin Loernius, and another Hin. These men, being of noble birth and wishing to crown their nobleness with deeds of faith, had chosen to lead a bermit’s life ; and when I found them meek and gentle, I chose to be in low estate with them, rather than to dwell in kings’ palaces. And since we were all of one heart and one mind, we chose to dwell together, and eat and drink in common, and sleep in the same house.

And so they set me, though unwilling, at their head: for indeed I was not worthy to unloose the latchet of their shoes. And, when we were thus leading the monastic life according to the pattern of the approved fathers, the brothers showed me writings of St Phagan and St Deruvian, wherein it was contained that twelve disciples of St Philip and St James had built that Old Church in honour of our Patroness aforesaid, instructed thereto by the blessed archangel Gabriel.

Last April I posted a piece that discussed one of the story lines in my medieval historical fiction book, A Murder of Crows, currently represented by Peter Miller of Global Lion Intellectual Property Management. The particular story line I’m referring to is the 1186 unusual line up of planets in Libra. The medieval astrologers of the time believed( and apparently even the Archbishop of Canterbury believed) that the planetary line up boded disaster; end times were upon them. Fortunately they misread the intent of the celestial message and we’re still here!

However, since that event nearly 900 years ago, it’s probably safe to say without plowing through astrological data reaching back through the centuries, that up until now such alignments have occurred time to time. From an evolutionary astrological point of view one suspects there’s a message for humanity in these alignments. Inquiring minds want to know…what do these configurations mean?

In the spirit of those medieval astrologers, there have likely been similar claims through the years insisting that such alignments will never happen again, especially because the end is near one more time-although not for everyone since we’re informed from time to time that those who are ‘chosen’ will be spirited away in some sort of UFO to safety.

For those of us who aren’t preparing for our seat on the UFO any time soon, we can take comfort in the fact that regarding our personal Soul growth and the global evolution, there’s something to be learned when the Sun, Mercury, Mars, Venus, Neptune and the asteroid Chiron, all meet up inPisces on March 6th.

So again, what does this all mean? In general, one of the highest evolutionary expressions of Pisces and its planetary ruler, Neptune, is for us to shift our consciousness from focusing exclusively on self to beyond this boundary for global healing, for the greater good. What is our individual purpose in the bigger picture? In the words of Dr. Edward Bach, discoverer of the famous 38 Bach Flower Remedies, “everyone has a job in this lifetime.” In other words, each of us possesses an important contribution to make to the whole. No matter how small ‘we’ may think we are in the bigger picture, none of us is here by accident. All of us can’t find the cure for cancer or solution to the world’s hunger problems, water shortages or global warming, but…each of us has a job.

With all of these planets, especially Neptune and the wounded healer archetype Chiron, in the watery sign of Pisces we’ll need to dig down into our emotional core in order to determine how this message translates for each of us. Astrologically, clues to this translation can be found according to the zodiacal house(circumstance of life) in which this alignment falls in our own birth chart.

Perhaps this alignment refers to your skill set or health; that would be the sixth house. Is there a focus on your personal relationships or partnerships in some way, indicated by the line up falling in your fifth, seventh or eighth house? In any case, wherever this alignment falls, we’re being called to think and act beyond our personal ‘box’ for the greater good and our own Soul’s evolution.

For those who don’t have access to astrological software there are two excellent on line resources readily available to help and guide you, free of charge. At Astrodeinst, you can cast your birth chart; all you need is your birth date, location and time of birth. Deborah Houlding’s ‘Sky Script‘ is an excellent site for reading and learning about the meanings of the houses, signs and other astrological in-depth information.

As you contemplate this information, think about what’s holding you back? What is it that’s preventing you from taking ‘the road less traveled’? You might surprise yourself!